has landed an upcoming interview with michele obama. that's it for this edition of "reliable sources." if you missed our program check us out on mondays on itunes. search for reliable sources in the store. we're back next sunday morning for another critical look at the media. "state of the union" with candy crowley begins right now. >> and the award for best dramatic performance goes to -- washington? today, if you can't beat them, scare them. >> we are required to cut $1 billion and if more than half of our employees are at the faa, the faa -- there has to be some impact. >> delayed planes and canceled flights, the world of automatic budget cuts, according to transportation secretary, ray lahood. then, despite some republican calls to pull the plug on chuck hagel's nomination for defense chief, and a slow walk of the nomination of john brennan as cia director, the president stands by his men.

he will probably get what he wants. weighing the odds with senator john mccain. and guns and immigration. before bills governing either become law, they first go through the judiciary committees. a conversation with senator judiciary chairman, patrick leahy, about the art of the doable on two of the most contentious issues of our time. plus, five days from the next fiscal cliffhanger on forced spending cuts. >> these cuts don't have to happen. congress can turn them off any time with just a little compromise. >> deal or more hyperbole? we will ask our political package, former governor haley barbour, jackie calmes, of the "new york times." i'm candy crowley. and this is "state of the union." with five days to go until automatic spending cuts kick in, the obama administration is ratcheting up warnings about

aircraft carriers that can't make it to the persian gulf and commercial airlines that won't fly. if you are planning on flying anywhere in the next month or so the transportation secretary warns you should brace for more flight delays and longer wait times at airport security checkpoints. secretary ray lahood joins me now. thank you so much for being here to talk about this. >> thank you. good morning. >> help me understand this. as far as we can figure out, the faa budget, not even talking about transportation, is about $15 billion, give or take. they are going to have to cut $600 million. about 4%. why is that enough to cause planes to be delayed for an hour and a half? there surely must be things inside the faa budget where you could get rid of 4%. >> and we are gonna do that, candy. we have been spending the last several months looking at and we will really focus on this now, every contract to see what penalties we might have to pay. we are going to cancel contracts. we are going to look at everything we possibly can to

get to where we need to be, which is about $600 million in cuts. but we can't do it without also furloughing people and we're going to have to furlough -- >> 4% is -- that's very big budget. let me add something else, a republican from capitol hill and leadership office messaged and said, listen, the budget committee took a look at some of these numbers and they found that postsequester, your postsequester total, at faa ops and facilities and equipment, is going to be about $500 million more than 2008 and the planes were running just fine. so, what's -- i'm trying to figure out, as you know, people are saying the administration is exaggerating this. so, if you're going to be having totals, inflation adjusted, at 2008 levels, why all of this sturm and drang about, oh, my goodness, the planes are going to be late?

>> well, first of all we're required to cut $1 billion. the largest number of employees at d.o.t. is at faa, which the largest number are faa controllers. we are going to try to cut as much as we possibly can out of contracts and other things that we do but in the end, there has to be some kind of furlough of air traffic control -- air traffic controllers, then that then will also begin to curtail or eliminate the opportunity for them to guide planes in and out of airports. >> sure. >> it's a big part of our budget. >> is it true that domestic flights are down 27% from pre 9/11 levels and the budget at the faa is up 41%? >> well, look, we know that airlines have consolidated. we have approved some of those consolidations and in doing that --

>> there's less traffic. >>s theres a less traffic. >> less traffic, of course. >> but more budget. >> well, look, budgets have -- go up and down, but the bottom line here is that there's sequester required. it's required by law. it means we have to make these cuts. this is not stuff that we just decided to make up to -- >> sure. no, i understand. i guess i'm trying to get at, people think, wait a minute, there surely has to be money you can take, you say you're going to look at it, without having to have delayed flights. the idea is this was ginned up by the administration, not just you, but aircraft carriers can't go here and there, to try to put pressure on congress. i'm going to -- i want to -- speaking of pressure on congress, you were quite vocal about who you blame for this when you did your news conference. i want to play just a little bit of that. >> this requires republicans stepping forward with some ideas about how to keep essential services of government running at the level that people have

been accustomed to. this is not rocket science. this is people coming together the way that other congresses have done to solve big -- to solve big issues. >> you're a republican. you spent a lot of time on capitol hill before your current job. i understand that you work for the president now and he is a democrat. is it all the republicans' fault? >> well, look it, this sequester is very serious business and it requires us to make the reductions that we're making. it requires us, as painful as it is, to furlough the people that we're gonna have to furlough and we are taking it very seriously. we hope that this week, republicans and democrats will step forward. the president put forth a plan to find the $85 billion. $85 billion is a lot of money, candy, and we -- there has to be shared sacrifice here. we are doing our part. and part of what we are doing is saying to people that these reductions are -- these furloughs -- >> do you think that republicans

are solely to blame for this? it just seemed that way when you gave your news conference? >> well, look, i'm a republican. my audience is trying to persuade my former colleagues that they need to come to the table with a proposal, which frankly they haven't done, while the president has, the republicans haven't. i also at that news conference said everybody around here ought to go take a look at the "lincoln" movie where they did very hard things by work g together, talking together and compromising that's what's needed here. >> transportation secretary ray lahood, thank you for your time this morning. thank you for your service. this might be your swan swong, at least as secretary secretary. i know you're retiring. thanks for your service, first on capitol hill and then as transportation secretary. >> thank you, candy. >> when we return, republicans are demanding more answers from cia nominee brennan and hagel as defense secretary. might the president's former rival help get those through confirmation? john mccain is up next.

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joining me now is senator john mccain of arizona. i want to talk to you about these sequester, these budget cuts, automatic budget cuts. you heard transportation secretary ray lahood talking about them.

here's my question for you. everyone thinks this is a -- bad things are going to happen when these forced cuts go into affect. the military says that the training is gonna suffer, that they are not gonna be able to get ships to the persian gulf. you know, that we can't inspect meat, the planes are gonna slow down. if it is this dire and everyone agrees it is this dire, what happens? congress goes on recess and the president goes golfing. why isn't somebody in a room somewhere, in a shirt they have had on for three days, ordering takeout pizza with a bunch of people trying to figure it out if it is that bad? >> that is exactly what we should be doing, but i won't put all the blame on the president of the united states. but the president leads. he should be calling us from somewhere, camp david you wherever, and discuss the cuts. let me say something about the cuts quickly. we have already cut $87 billion

out of under defense secretary gates. we are on track to cut another out of defense. you lay on top of that these enormous reductions as well, then -- and by the way, defense is 19% of the overall discretionary budget. defense has taken 50% of the cuts. and if we don't believe our military leaders, then who in the world do we believe? and i think that what we are doing now to the men and women who are serving is unconscionable because they deserve a predictable life in the military and also, these federal employees don't know whether they are going to be laid off or not, not to mention these contractors. >> doesn't it make my point? shouldn't somebody somewhere be in a building figuring this out? >> absolutely. i stand -- senator levin and senator graham and senator ayotte and i and senator reid and i tried a year ago. a year ago, senator graham and i and senator ayotte went around the country to various places,

including norfolk, virginia, where the president, i understand is going this coming week, warning of the effects of these cuts. and i -- and i say to my republican friends, if you want to just give the president flexibility as to how to enact these cuts in defense spending then why don't we just go home and give him the money? i am totally opposed to that. we spent too long on defense authorization and finding out what this country needs to secure this country without saying, hey, well, we will just let the president have the, quote, flexibility. that is not the answer. the answer is to prevent the reductions. we are cutting defense. i can find lots of waste in mismanagement. but by god, across-the-board cuts are the worst and most cowardly way to approach this situation. >> and yet, we're headed there. >> yes, we are. >> you know, again, just so frustrating, you think, god, somebody ought to pick this up and do something about it. >> and again, republican leaders should be saying to the president, along with democratic leaders, let's sit down and work this out.

that's the way we've avoided crises in the past. >> what do you make of secretary lahood, a republican, blaming republicans for this? >> shame on ray lahood. no, listen, i understand, but i think there's a bob woodward piece in "the post" this morning that gives the tick-tock about who really -- the idea for sequestration it was. we now know whose it was. it came from the white house and the president's aides. despite that -- >> congress went for it. >> the president said during the campaign, won't happen. i said during the campaign and so did others say we got to stop this from happening. the president has now said it was congress's fault. we know the president wasn't telling the truth about that. >> 15 of your colleagues, i want to switch to chuck hagel, nominated to be defense secretary, 15 of your colleagues including jim imhoff, sent a letter to the president saying withdraw this name, many

reasons why he should not be secretary of defense. why didn't you sign that letter? >> because i did not believe that chuck hagel who is a friend of mine, is qualified to be secretary of defense. but i do believe that elections have consequences. unfortunately. the president of the united states was reelected, i believe when the questions are answered and i believe they will be by this coming week, that the president deserves an up or down vote. democrats will say we've never did that before and they have, with bolton and john tower and others, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't give chuck hagel an up or down vote and i think we should. as far as you know, anything standing between chuck hagel and that vote, a hold, anybody willing to do that? do you think this will happen? >> i think it will happen, barring some additional revelation -- >> something we don't know? >> concerning his comments about israel and all those unfortunate things he said in the past. >> let me ask you about john brennan, nominated to be cia director.

you have wanted information about benghazi about that. how far are you willing to go to delay the brennan vote to get the information you want? >> i think it depends on his answers to start with. second of all, we don't know who was rescued from the consulate in benghazi. we still don't know who made up the talking points. mr. brennan said he was opposed to waterboarding and torture, but at the same time, he said, it has saved lives. i would like to know what lives were saved because the information that i have is that it saved no one's life. in fact, it was a lot of misinformation. >> if you don't get answers would you put a hold on that? would you try to slow down? >> i think you examine your options when you decide on the information. but he needs to answer these questions. they say why now? it's the only time we have the maximum leverage. that's just a fact of life around washington. look, i don't want to put a hold on anybody, but the american people deceive answers about

benghazi. there are so many questions that are still out there, including what was the president doing the night benghazi happened? >> let me turn you finally to a domestic issue here, that is immigration. you had quite the town hall meeting, series of them when you were out in arizona, i just want to show our listeners a little bit of what happened. >> they are going to be on medicare, they are going to be on we will tear, going to be on -- on welfare, food stamps, and what's going to happen is -- you know, i'm going to -- >> again, sir, you're not telling these people the truth. >> why bring a 30 million people into the united states -- cut off their welfare, and their stuff, and then they'll go back. >> lots of echoes here of previous elections. >> but you know, some people say, oh, look at that, that's what town halls are supposed to be about. that's why they are always packed, as you noticed. i've had town hall meetings for 30 years and sometimes they

become very spirited. i enjoy them. we don't screen anybody who comes to our town hall meeting s and it gives the people of arizona a chance. now, didn't believe that that person was correct with his facts so i fired back at him and people said you good, that's what we want to hear this is the debate we want to hear. so, i'm proud of that if anybody doesn't like it then down the have to come to the town hall meet egg. -- meeting. >> what does it tell you about the base of the republican party? does it tell you that you have got a problem here in selling immigration reform? >> actually, the majority of americans, and i believe the majority of republicans, as long as they are -- one, the border is effectively controlled and, two, that the people who are here illegally get in the line behind everyone else who came here legally, because they broke the law, but just because they broke the law doesn't mean they are condemned forever to a twilight status. i think most americans, if these people who have come here illegally, pay

back taxes, pay a fine, learn english and get in line behind everybody else, that is a key element of it. most americans realize we can't have 11 million people sit in the twilight, in the shadows of america forever. >> most americans don't vote in republican primaries what do you think the effect will be next year? >> i think it's going to be okay, as long as they are satisfied we have effective control over our boarder and we don't make the mistake of 1986. we gave amnesty to 3 million people and ended up with 11 million here illegally. we can't have a third wave. >> senator john mccain, good to have you. >> thank you for having me on. >> a u.s. delegation went to cuba this week to meet with president raul castro about securing the release of an imprisoned american. they came home empty handed. would ending the embargo help bring an american prisoner home. senator patrick leahy joins us next. >> i think everybody realizes that this is not the 1960s. it is a different century, different world. we have to adapt to it. i upgraw sprint direct connect.

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it's been almost two decades since congress passed major gun control legislation. almost three for immigration reform. as we explain it in washington, the politics are difficult. but the overwhelmingly

democratic hispanic vote in november's election and december's horrific mass murders inside a connecticut elementary school, transformed two of the most volatile issues on the congressional docket into the two most likely to see action. public opinion favors reform on both iues and that tends to concentrate the minds of politicians not to mention give them some cover. still, the politics remain difficult. >> you don't need an ar-15. it's harder to aim. it's harder to use. and, in fact, you don't need 30 rounds to protect yourself. buy a shotgun. >> see, it's not about making our kids or our streets safer, it's all about their decades old agenda. the elites in washington are not serious. >> as for the politics of immigration, consider the ruckus after the president's idea of reform was leaked into the

delicate atmosphere of ongoing bipartisan negotiations. >> i know that senator rubio was upset with this leak. >> leaking this out does set things in the wrong direction. >> in reality, the specifics are a lot more difficult than the general notion of reform. under what conditions should undocumented workers be allowed to pursue legal status? should legalization be tied to border security? should gun magazines be limited to what? ten rounds, seven rounds? and what exemptions should there be to universal background checks? just because most lawmakers want to do something doesn't mean they want to do everything. you know what is in the details. eventually, immigration and gun control reform, details and all, will run through the judiciary committee and its chairman, senator patrick leahy, is here with his take on what's doable

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then you're going to love this. right now they're only $14.95! wow-a grt deal just got a whole lot better. hurry. $14.95 won't last. this is not universal background checks. this is universal registration of all of your firearms and all of people like you all over america. >> that was wayne lapierre, executive vice president of the nra speaking last night at the western hunting and conservation expo. joining me now is senate judiciary chairman patrick leahy of vermont. is that true? you know that's what some gun hunters, gun owners fear, that a background check is nothing more than a way to get registration? >> no, it's not going to be

registration. of course the speaker knows that, but he's paid very well to stir up the -- his membership and to help increase dues paying members but we ought to lower the rhetoric and talk about reality. i'm a gun owner. a lot of people in my state are gun owners. i know the last time i went in to purchase a fire arms i had to go through a background check. i didn't have any problem with doing that. >> what do they do with this information? this is my name, this is my address, this is my phone number. i don't have any mental health problems. what do they do with this when they put it in a background check? >> if they are told the truth and it is cleared out -- >> deleted is what you're saying? >> yes. but what happens, i don't mind having a background check for me. but i don't want somebody that has two felonies maybe for armed robbery and unless you have a universal background check,

it doesn't apply to somebody who may have had felonies. the fact is most gun owners i talked with in vermont, say okay, what rules are, as long as it applies to everybody. don't make exceptions. unfortunately, the speaker was talking about makes exceptions. i don't think there should be exceptions at a gun show or for straw purchasers. we want to say that everybody, so that if you have a violent crime in your background, if you're under a restraining order, if you have some of these problems you're not going to be able to legally purchase a firearm. >> at gun shows is what we are talking about? >> gun shows or -- >> expanding the background checks to gun shows and private sales. >> gun stores. i mean, your local gun store has to pay taxes to the community you to the state. fill out all these rules why should they have to have stiff er rules on them than somebody who comes and sets up in the fairground for a week?

>> we want to clarify, you say the speaker in your previous remarks, talking about wayne lapierre, not speaker boehner. >> no, no, no. not speaker boehner. >> okay. but what you are saying is, that all of that information, if you are a law-abiding citizen, with no felonies on your record, no mental health problems, whatever information you have given to that gun store, whoever, that is then fed into a background check, goes away, they press delete? >> yeah. >> let me ask you, so many issues that are coming to your committee. i wanted to ask you about immigration. you made an opening statement during one of your hearings that you said you basically oppose the idea of tying border security to allowing undocumented workers to begin a

pathway towards legalization. and yet, what we're led to believe is that bipartisan committee wants to do exactly that. >> no, what i'm saying is don't make the -- the perfect the enemy of the good. if you say there must be total security before we can go forward, that's never gonna happen. we spend billions and billions of dollars -- >> you wouldn't mind measurements along the way? >> i don't mind measurements. i think this administration, the obama administration, spent more money on border security than any administration in history. there are still gonna be some people getting through. i just don't want it to be a case where you say, well, until we know that not one person can get through, we have immigration reform, that's never gonna happen. work in tandem on it, improve border security, of course, but at the same time, find some way to have immigration reform. the time is now. it's unrealistic to expect that

somebody -- you're going to have 11 million people who just throw you out of the country. you couldn't do it. we're not going to do it. let's find out how they come in, the same way my maternal grandparents came in or my wife's parents came in. let's have some way to make sure they can become citizens. >> i want to ask you about your recent trip to cuba, but just a wrap-up questions on both these issues, guns and immigration, end of this year, will you be able to say that this first year of this congress passed both iigration reform and gun control reform in some manner? >> i think we will if people want to come together. i don't want it to be a bart san -- partisan bill. i'm working with both republicans and democrats, unless we work with both republicans and democrats, we will pass nothing. >> you were recently in cuba, you met with alan gross, an american in cuba, a contract worker. he's been detained since 2009. you also met with raul castro, the new president. did you speak to him about the

fate of mr. gross and what did you find out about a, mr. gross' health and b, whether there's any room in there to get him out? >> well, i have spoken twice to president are a president raul castro about mr. gross. both my wife and i have met with him twice. i've met with mr. gross twice. i did this past week. i would say i would have loved to have put him on my airplane and brought him back out with me. that's not going to happen. he is not going to be released by the cubans because of pressure from the united states. that does not work. it hasn't worked in the past. i think there are ways that he can be released, but's going to -- but it's going to require some give and take on both sides an some quiet negotiation. i think the worst thing that can happen is if we stay either in our country or their country,

in this 1960s and 1970s cold war mentality, we're a different century now. we should be looking at what the future for their people and ours, the future of their children and our children, and i think if we do that i think we can find things, not only to set -- settle the alan gross issue but a whole lot of other issues. >> you are suggesting, listen what about if we ease the embargo further or got rid of the embargo, if you let him go i will work for it. that kind of thing? >> you know, i'm not going to go into the specific things, but we have a number of issues that we should be looking at. we have them on a terrorist list. it makes no sense. they've been working to help the colombians on the ish shoe you of the farc. they have been very effective. they have worked with us on drug interdiction. that is something that can be removed. there are a lot of things we can do. the embargo is an obvious one. i mean, the idea that you and i

have to get permission to go over to cuba from our own government, you know, it makes no sense. >> a relic of the past. you have a lot on your plate, senator. good luck. >> it's going to be an interesting year. >> if the spending cuts go through, whose fault is it? that's easy. the other guy's. >> it appears that republicans in congress have decided instead of compromising they would rather let these cuts fall on the middle class. >> why won't he work with us? the answer quite simply is because he wants higher taxes. e. [ male announcer ] it's called ocuvite. a vitamin totally dedicated to your eyes, from the eye care experts at bausch + lomb. as you age, eyes can lose vital nutrients. ocuvite helps replenish key eye nutrients. ocuvite has a unique formula not found in your multivitamin to help protect your eye health. now that's a pill worth taking. [ male announcer ] ocuvite. help protect your eye health.

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then you're going to love this. right now they're only $14.95! wow-a grt deal just got a whole lot better. hurry. $14.95 won't last. here with me around the table, gwen, of pbs, connecticut governor daniel maloy, jackie

collins of the "new york times." when we went into the break, we heard the president say the republicans just aren't working with me on sequestration, the auto budget cuts and we had the republicans saying why won't the president work with us on this? in the end who gets the blame for this? >> this, by the way, is we can't do meat inspection and fly planes and send ships to the gulf. >> right. there's a lot on both your houses. the republicans come into this with the polls in the past and these showdowns which have become so routine, that they've come out the losers on this and they know it. they're at a disadvantage. any time the party that's power is in the congressional wing is at a relative disadvantage of the president of which ever party the president is from -- but the republicans have a record here. the polls have shown in the past they've been blamed more than the president and that's likely to happen here too. i mean if not -- just for the

fact that last week they were on vacation all week, democrats and republicans in congress. >> so, bad idea to force the sequestration, the budget cuts? >> if it was a bad idea, it is the president's idea. the president brought up this idea. the republicans and democrats -- >> went along with it. >> couldn't agree on budget -- deficit reduction, went along with it. since then the republican house has twice, twice passed alternatives to the sequestration. the democrats have never taken it up, the president has never dealt with it. so who gets the blame? i think the public would say why didn't the president do something? why did they take the vacation when the republicans passed two solutions. >> they passed it two congresses. >> they did. >> it's true. >> they would have got it -- the

middle class in that proposal. that's what that da did. we have to tell the whole story here. they want to make sure they get their defense spending so they want to take more out of services. they want to take more out of the middle class. they want to really beat up the middle class pretty bad. that's unacceptable. come to the table everybody. everybody come to the table. work this thing out. let's be adults. >> gwen, do you agree? the president went golfing. he has a perfect right to go golfing. congress takes a break, they take breaks all the time, yet we are told that life as we know it is going to change and they're off not paying attention. >> why the polls that jackie was talking about, show people are so ultimately frustrated by this. the pinger pointing does no one any good. whoever put it on the table matters not, if, indeed, air traffic controllers won't be showing up to work, going to be furloughed. i do think we've spent this week with the president and the white house saying the sky is falling, but if you're at home ant don't know what the word sequestration

means, all it means is washington isn't working again, no matter whose fault it is. >> we're going to furlough 576 national guardsmen in connecticut. that's what we're going to do. this has real consequences. and it's absolutely the wrong time to be doing this. it is estimated by the congressional budget office that this will cost 750,000 jobs at absolutely the wrong time. we have states that are finally adding jobs and what does congress want to do? they want to cut 750,000 jobs. >> look, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. you know. >> go ahead. i want to say this whole thing who is to blame for sequester is one of the oddest arguments i've covered in washington for 30 years. both sides, the particulars came

from the white house, they took an idea i'm sorry to say i covered in the mid-80s for "congressional quarterly" magazine and two republican senators came up with what they said was a bad idea whose time has come. both parties in this case wanted something so odious it would force them to the negotiating table. that hasn't happened. >> the one thing more odious than this is the negotiating table. while i have you here, i want to ask you about immigration, since this is a cause you have taken up. i want to read you something that charlie cook, well-known political analyst out of "national journal" said about the president. if the president really cares about enacting immigration reform, he will get off the campaign trail, depoliticize it and keep as quiet about it as he can. >> i think charlie cook has made a very accurate statement. i was pleased to hear senator leahy say we need to be bipartisan. there is bipartisan support.

there's a lot of complicated stuff. i was political director of the white house when we did this more than 25 years ago, the last time. it took two full years. either it's going to happen this spring, that's not realistic. this is complex and for many people contentious. i think it will happen in this congress, but it has to be bipartisan to be successful. >> and gwen, we saw this week with john mccain's town hall meetings, this is becoming -- i'm talking about gun control later, the same way as i see as the gun control legislation, the edge in that fervor of let's pass it has given way to reality. >> the difference what the white house is pushing is gun control legislation, violence policy the term they're using now. when it comes to immigration the sticking point is not all the bad feelings about whether we should do it or not the sticking point is border security, which actually molly from the atlantic wrote this week which turns out that the border security is stronger than it's been in places like el paso and san

diego. we're having a fight about the sticking point when all the bigger, longer term who gets the end of the line types are the up withes which are going to cause the emotion. >> let me ask you to gwen's point, when you were at the meeting at the white house with the president, did he bring up immigration reform. >> we spent a lot of time on the first issue we touched here. the idea that the president shouldn't speak to this issue is utterly ridiculous. of course he should speak to this and he should lead the discussion. that's the role of the president of the united states. for one party to recommend he not speak about one of the most important issues facing the nation is ridiculous. >> it was charlie cook, a political analyst. but i take your point. >> a reporter. >> i just heard it. >> the president should not let this be party san. when the president leaves like ronald -- leads like ronald reagan or bill clinton he leads for bipartisan. >> the vice president has some advice on what kind of gun to buy. >> you should be able to go buy

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we are back with gwen ifill, governor dan malloy, former governor haley barbour and jackie calmes. about joe biden and his frequently, over the past week or so, told folks they ought to buy shotguns, they're much better than semi assault weapons. i want to show some of what the nra has done with that in an online ad. >> if there's ever a problem, just walk out on the balcony here, walk out, put that double-barrel shotgun and fire two blasts outside the house. >> more than 300,000 women face aggravated assault every year and joe biden's answer? >> fire two blasts outside the house. >> great advice, joe. not only would that be illegal, but a woman would then face an attacker with an empty shotgun. >> is the vice president helping your cause when these sorts of

things get turned into ads like this? >> more women will be killed by guns that their husbands have in the house this year than last year. that's what's going on here. women are the victim of this crime. women are shot and killed by their husbands and lovers. let's not play games that the nra wants us to play. sure. well go ahead, i just let you take that one. >> i don't know why the nra got the vice president biden to say that. >> he is advocating shotguns. shotguns are perfectly legal. they hunt. he's gun guy. >> as opposed to -- >> as opposed to -- >> repeat capacity weapons. >> ar-15 things that we keep -- it is just so ripe for them to take action. >> listen, you had a piece on by the vice president of the nra. listen, he's a gold mine, that guy. i mean he -- there is a disconnect here. newtontown has changed this country. it is a different debate. it is a different discussion. i understand someday, states will go and do their own thing,

perhaps we'll get something out of the congress of the united states. why should anyone be able to buy a gun without a permit? why? you can't get on a plane without somebody doing a background check. why should you be able to buy a gun and not have that done? >> joe biden had a couple of points, but one was that he -- that he's trying to imply or show that democrats aren't anti-gun. >> right. >> it's like he's dammed if he does, dammed if he doesn't. us, you know, the nra, it made for a good commercial. the fact of the matter is, he's not anti-gun. >> democrats are not trying to get rid of people's guns? >> i think what's more important here governor malloy's state has -- i think i heard you say, one of the five toughest gun control laws of the united states. everything this man did who murdered these children in an awful, horrific, unbelievably gruesome thing was already illegal that's why guys like me say if you make having guns illegal, only criminals will have guns.

this guy, everything he did was already against the law. if being against the law would have stopped it, it wouldn't have happened. >> can't we also say there's actual movement happening on capitol hill? four bipartisan senators are reaching an agreement on the idea of universal background checks. there will be exceptions, limitations, but there actually is movement happening and i don't think that would have happened without newtown. >> governor malloy, i want to ask you about that, you put out your own state proposal for what you would like to do in terms of cracking down on gun sales and the illegal purchase of guns, et cetera. there was criticism at the time last week that you did it before a commission came out and said here is what i recommend. do you sense that time is running out, that you're losing that window of opportunity, post newtown? >> 72 days later, the people of newtown, the children who were murdered, the adults who murdered deserved an answer. haley is wrong about what he

said. you can buy an ar-15 in our state. i look forward to when you can't do that you can buy 30-round magazines, when before april 2004, that was illegal. i look forward to connecticut doing away with 30-round magazines. i believe we need universal background checks. you should not be able it to buy a gun at a gun show or private sale without a background check. these are common sense approaches. what's going to happen is inevitable because there are going to be more shootings in schools, there are going to be more shootings in movie theaters, more shootings in malls. this is going to happen, it's just a question of how many more people have to die before it happens. >> the fact of the matter is gwen is right, there are things that are happening about mentally ill people. how do we keep mentally ill people like criminals from not being able to have guns. how do we stop that or have some way to deal with that. we need to look at the entertainment industry. if you go to a gun store they will tell you why do people buy

these rifles? they see them on tv. they see them in the video games. there's a lot here to work on. i think gun control is not an answer at all. but there are answers we have to find. >> all we hear, we saw in your proposal, the federal proposals, mentally ill people should not be allowed to get guns. that's great. how about getting mentally ill people easy access to care, that comes up in nobody's proposal and yet that's the one thing everybody seems to think really might be helpful. >> i happen to come from a state that has 40,000 people covered by medicaid that wouldn't be covered in any other state. and because they're covered by medicaid they have that kind of access. we're going to grow that access and and one of the things that obama care does is grow that access. we have to build that system. we will leave it there. >> i have to go. come back, again, all of you. thank you. and thank you for watching